From: gerald_a_levy (gerald_a_levy@msn.com)
Date: Fri Sep 06 2002 - 09:15:11 EDT
Re [76l3]: > It is not a matter of historical contigency that the money > commodity in a system of general commodity production was not a > *freely* reproducible or an ordinary, run-of-mill durable consumer > good with a small secondary market; as Michele Naples has already > suggested: > "... Marx made clear that the good which serves as commodity money > must be scarce to serve as money. Just as Marx rejected Ricardo, he > would reject the neo Ricardian model where the exchange value of > money is determined in the same way as other commodities' price of > production." Freeman and Carchedi, eds. p.103 Isn't whether money took the form of a money commodity under capitalism a matter of historical contingency? After all, the state could have offered paper currency printed in its name as money and banned the use of any other materials (gold and silver included) as money. That paper currency issued by the state was first introduced under a monetary system where there was a money commodity and was "backed-up" by the stock of gold and silver held by the state seems also to be a matter of historical contingency. This topic -- the state's role in a capitalist monetary system -- wasn't fully developed in Volume One -- or the rest of _Capital_ -- since the state-form was being abstracted from at that level of exposition. In solidarity, Jerry
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